COVID-19: how Colombia will change after the pandemic

The crisis caused by COVID-19 has sparked reflections on how the virus will transform our societies and economic systems. In the country, however, this discussion begins with more basic and primary elements. There is room to think about significant changes.

The pandemic has sparked a lot of reflections and visions by academics and activists about the global “future”. Some of the most prominent were those raised by Slavoj Žižek and Byung-Chul Han, the first identifying the crisis as a blow to capitalism and the possibility of “thinking of an alternative society based on solidarity and global cooperation” and the second more skeptical, stating that the virus will not defeat capitalism, but can even deepen individualism and lead to authoritarianism.

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Within the global reflections that have emerged, two contrasting visions are also identified: one that proposes changes while safeguarding the current social and economic structure, that is, a readjustment of the markets and the role of the State, and another associated with the importance of structurally changing the social and economic purposes. Where could Colombia be located in reflections of this type?

Several years ago, in a project carried out at the National University called “Colombia, a country to be built”, of which I was a part, a structural analysis of the critical problems of Colombia was carried out (30 topics were identified, separated into subsystems: social, economic, natural, knowledge and political), all interrelated, some being more consequences of others. From this analysis, “corruption” and “impunity” were identified as structural axes. This may still be in effect.

These “structural” axes, complemented by violence, concentration of power and high levels of exclusion and inequality, show that as a country we are perhaps in a discussion “prior” to the global reflections mentioned above. Imagining a “sustainable, resilient and inclusive” scenario in Colombia is a greater challenge, considering that we are a country in which illegal armed groups that control territories persist and social and environmental leaders (including in quarantine) are massacred, in the midst of the distraction and indifference of much of society.

In Colombia, the pandemic has exposed not only the ineffectiveness of markets and neoliberalism, but structural problems such as corruption, impunity, concentration of power and exclusion. In this context, is a more sustainable, fair and inclusive post-pandemic scenario possible? Daring to talk about “what is possible”, the answer is yes, but this answer necessarily goes through the construction of long-term processes.

In recent years I have worked in class on Kate Raworth’s approaches to creating a new “compass” that changes the traditional indicators of “success” focused on production and economic growth, usually associated with well-being, but which have been contrary associated with inequity and environmental degradation. Can you think of a compass like the one proposed by Raworth where social and environmental aspects are a higher goal? This is clearly desirable, but how to achieve it? If we see it in the long term, Colombia has key elements that would allow the passage to better states, that transcend the structural inertia of corruption: a “growing” population with high capacity for analysis and critical sense; an educational sector committed to building a better country; an organized territorial diversity with multiple world views that refuses to be homogenized and “eliminated” and even a global context that begins to lead proposals for structural change.

Added to the above is the great creative potential of researchers with underutilized capabilities, or even the unemployed, despite the paradoxically “everything” is yet to be built. Long-term research questions are needed, beyond those asked by markets and demanded by current structures; interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary questions and ways of doing research that open new directions. Of course, there are possibilities of having better scenarios (sustainable, resilient, inclusive).

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For this reason, today more than ever, investment in research focused on transitions to different structures is necessary, starting with complexity, the interrelation between systems, the maintenance of life and human dignity, something very different from what There is currently a national level (a short-term vision, which maintains great power asymmetries at the cost of immense social costs).

This is why the bet must be long-term. Hope is in future generations and we (the current generation) have a duty to continue building new paths for them, an intergenerational altruism. Time will tell, but despite the low probabilities (in the short term), uncertainty works in our favor, anything can be possible.

* Professor, Faculty of Economic Sciences of the National University and Researcher of the CID.